Character Change and Theme Essay

Areas of Improvement, Essay Requirements and Essay Scoring

Common Areas of Improvement needed in character/thematic development essays:

  1. Underdeveloped thesis statements that don’t explain how a character changes in a story.
  2. Underdeveloped thesis statements that don’t explain how character changes prove theme.
  3. Underdeveloped topic sentences that don’t describe character at beginning of story or that don’t explain how and whycharacter changes during story.
  4. Topic sentences that are used to explain plot summary.
  5. Textual evidence that is used for plot summary rather than support of analysis or opinion.
  6. Summary in body paragraphs of character development and its relevance to thematic development.
  7. Quotes not being cited correctly

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Essay Requirements and Scoring

I-Introduction

  1. Hook
  2. Transition from hook to text being discussed.
  3. Brief summary of text (2-3sentences) including author and title.
  4. Transition from summary to thesis.
  5. Thesis statement that addresses how character changes from beginning to middle to end and how these changes prove the story’s theme. If necessary, the thesis statement can be two sentences.

II-BodyParagraphs Describing Character Change (use same format for three body paragraphs)

  1. Topic sentence focusing on character description or change and why the character changes.
  2. Contextual transition from topic sentence to concrete details that expand on topic sentence.
  3. Textual evidence that supports concrete details.
  4. Analysis and/or explanation of importance and relevance of textual evidence. Repeat steps 3 and 4 for each example of textual evidence.
  5. Summary of character development.

III-Body Paragraph Connecting Character Change to Story’s Theme

  1. Topic sentence focusing on how character change proved or demonstrated theme.
  2. Transition from topic sentence to concrete details that expand on topic sentence.
  3. Analysis of how character changes prove theme
  4. Concluding sentence(s).

IV-Conclusion

  1. Re-phrase essay’s thesis statement
  2. Summary of concrete details and/or textual evidence used to demonstrate character development
  3. Connection from text to real world

Using and Citing Textual Evidence

1. All opinions, assertions, analyses, etc. need to be supported with textual evidence that is either paraphrased or presented verbatim from the text.

2. Usually, textual evidence citations appear in parentheses after a quote, direct passage or paraphrased passage and includechapter #, page #, act #, scene #, line #, etc. depending on the source being used.